I’ve been hearing about a possible sequel to Free Enterprise for over ten years now. I really thought it was a pipe dream that would never happen. But apparently the sequel is actually happening, likely thanks to the recent jump in Trek popularity thanks to the JJ Abrams‘ Star Trek-reboot. If you haven’t yet watched Robert Meyer Burnett‘s 1998 indie film, it can be easily described as Swingers for sci-fi geeks. It was about two aspiring LA filmmakers/Trek geeks who meet their screen idol, William Shatner (played by himself), who turns out to be nothing like the person they had imagined. The film has gone on to become something of a cult classic among geeks, and I highly recommend you check it out.

Burnett has been trying to get a sequel greenlit for years now, and it is now falling into place.

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary added the word “fanboy” last year, and they list its first usage as 1919. Sadly, they don’t provide any examples for that usage. Curly Lambeau founded the Green Bay Packers that year in Wisconsin, but I don’t think he had throngs of fanboys around him just yet. For the record, Merriam-Webster defines a fanboy as, “A boy who is an enthusiastic devotee (as of comics or movies).” Interesting that they don’t include the term fangirl, which I hear all the time. Can’t a girl be just as enthusiastic as a boy, Merriam-Webster?

Although fanboys really came into common usage when it applied to comic book fans, since the 90s it’s come to cover enthusiasts of movies, video games, TV shows, music, and anything else people seem to line up for. It’s also grown out of its original usage as a derogatory word used to conjure up images of people like the Comic Book Guy on The Simpsons, and has become the marketing demographic that every company covets.

Given the rise of the power and size (no pun intended) of fans, it’s only normal that film cameras would start turning the other direction to document the phenomenon of fandom. First you have films that generate fans, then fans start making their own films, inspired by their fandom, then films that are made about the fans, and finally fictionalized movies depicting fans of fictional shows. It’s come full circle, and in today’s GeekBomb we explore the world of films about fans.